People were still asleep, but the river was as alive as in the daytime.
Rafts floated up and down-huge fields of logs with little wooden houses on them.
A small, vicious tug with the name Storm Conqueror written in a curve over the paddle cover towed along three oil barges in a line.
The Red Latvia, a fast mail boat, came up the river.
The Scriabin overtook a convoy of dredgers and, having measured her depth with a striped pole, began making a circle, turning against the stream.
Aboard ship people began to wake up.
A weighted cord was sent flying on to the Bramino quayside.
With this line the shoremen hauled over the thick end of the mooring rope.
The screws began turning the opposite way and half the river was covered with seething foam.
The Scriabin shook from the cutting strokes of the screw and sidled up to the pier.
It was too early for the lottery, which did not start until ten.
Work began aboard the Scriabin just as it would have done on land-at nine sharp.
No one changed his habits.
Those who were late for work on land were late here, too, although they slept on the very premises.
The field staff of the Ministry of Finance adjusted themselves to the new routine very quickly.
Office-boys swept out their cabins with the same lack of interest as they swept out the offices in Moscow.
The cleaners took around tea, and hurried with notes from the registry to the personnel department, not a bit surprised that the latter was in the stern and the registry in the prow.
In the mutual settlement cabin the abacuses clicked like castanets and the adding machine made a grinding sound.
In front of the wheelhouse someone was being hauled over the coals.
Scorching his bare feet on the hot deck, the smooth operator walked round and round a long strip of bunting, painting some words on it, which he kept comparing with a piece of paper:
"Everyone to the lottery!
Every worker should have government bonds in his pocket."
The smooth operator was doing his best, but his lack of talent was painfully obvious.
The words slanted downward and, at one stage, it looked as though the cloth had been completely spoiled.
Then, with the boy Pussy's help, Ostap turned the strip the other way round and began again.
He was now more careful.
Before daubing on the letters, he had made two parallel lines with string and chalk, and was now painting in the letters, cursing the innocent Vorobyaninov.
Vorobyaninov carried out his duties as boy conscientiously.
He ran below for hot water, melted the glue, sneezing as he did so, poured the paints into a bucket, and looked fawningly into the exacting artist's eyes.
When the slogan was dry, the concessionaires took it below and fixed it on the side.
The fat little man who had hired Ostap ran ashore to see what the new artist's work looked like from there.
The letters of the words were of different sizes and slightly cockeyed, but nothing could be done about it. He had to be content.
The brass band went ashore and began blaring out some stirring marches.
The sound of the music brought children running from the whole of Bramino and, after them, the peasant men and women from the orchards.
The band went on blaring until all the members of the lottery committee had gone ashore.
A meeting began.
From the porch steps of Korobkov's tea-house came the first sounds of a report on the international situation.
From the ship the Columbus Theatre goggled at the crowd.
They could see the white kerchiefs of the women, who were standing hesitantly a little way from the steps, a motionless throng of peasant men listening to the speaker, and the speaker himself, from time to time waving his hands.
Then the music began again.
The band turned around and marched towards the gangway, playing as it went.
A crowd of people poured after it.
The lottery device mechanically threw up its combination of figures.
Its wheels went around, the numbers were announced, and the Bramino citizens watched and listened.
Ostap hurried down for a moment, made certain all the inmates of the ship were in the lottery hall, and ran up on deck again.
"Vorobyaninov," he whispered. "I have an urgent task for you in the art department.
Stand by the entrance to the first-class corridor and sing.
If anyone comes, sing louder."
The old man was aghast.
"What shall I sing? "